1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to an electric connector having a plurality of wire connecting terminals and a method of connecting wires to the connector.
2. Description of the Prior Art
FIG. 1(A) shows an example of conventional female connector A roughly composed of a connector terminal T and a wire W. The terminal T includes a contact section 1 engageable with a mated male connector terminal (not shown) and a wire connecting section 2 connected to a wire. The wire connecting section 2 has an insulating cover material caulking portion 2a and a conductor material caulking portion 2b.
The above-mentioned connector terminal A is usually inserted into a cavity 4 of a connector housing 3 made of an insulating material (e.g. resin) and fixed thereto with a hole 7 formed in the contact section 1 engaged with a locking projection 6 provided for the connector housing 3, as shown in FIG. 1(B).
Conventionally, a plurality of connectors A.sub.1 to A.sub.4 are assembled into a single connector housing 3 having a plurality of cavities 4 to form a multiple female connector as shown in FIG. 1(C). In this case, the connectors A are fitted to the cavities 4 of the multiple connector housing 3, respectively in predetermined positional relationship to each other.
To fix plural connector terminals A.sub.1 to A.sub.4 to the multiple connector housing 3 in correct mutual positional relationship to each other, the conventional method is as follows: for example, four wires A having four different colors are selected; a first wire A.sub.1 having a first color (e.g. red) is fitted to a first housing cavity 4.sub.1 ; a second wire A.sub.2 having a second color (e.g. blue) is fitted to a second housing cavity 4.sub.2 and so on; the color arrangement of the wires are checked in accordance with a drawing or a process specification by visual inspection.
In the above-mentioned conventional connector or the method of connecting wires to the connector, it has been impossible to perfectly prevent erroneous connections between wires W and the housing 3, because there exist some cases where the inspector cannot notice the erroneous color arrangement of the wires (referred to as incorrect insertion of the terminal into the housing).
In addition, there exists another problem such that it is impossible to find imperfect engagement between the hole 7 formed in the connector terminal T and the locking projection 6 provided for the connector housing 3 (referred to as imperfect insertion of the terminal T into the housing 3).